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Yankees' Numbers Add Up to a Big Day

After a great July, Jason Giambi has not been having a very good August. He entered yesterday's game against the Kansas City Royals hitting .188, with only three extra-base hits in 22 games this month. But Giambi has never put much stock in statistics, especially when he is in a slump.

There are, however, some statistics that any player would savor. Giambi belted a three-run home run in the third inning yesterday, giving him 1,000 runs batted in for his career. In the fifth inning, he crushed a two-run homer, his 1,500th career hit.

Giambi's seven-R.B.I. day helped the Yankees beat the Royals, 10-3, at Yankee Stadium and finish a three-game sweep.

Giambi had no idea that he reached the milestones until Manager Joe Torre told him.

"Actually, Joe was the one who congratulated me," said Giambi, who also hit a two-run single in the sixth inning to tie a career high for R.B.I. in a game. "And I said: 'For what? I know ain't gotten a hit in a while.' But it's exciting, no doubt about it."

The Yankees (73-56) improved to a season-high 17 games above .500. They moved into the wild-card lead, by a half-game over Los Angeles, when the Angels fell behind Oakland in the American League West yesterday. The Yankees still trail the Red Sox by a game and a half in the East after Boston beat the Detroit Tigers, 11-3.

Giambi cooled off after being named the A.L.'s player of the month in July, when he hit .355 and had 14 homers. After dealing with tendinitis in his left elbow early in the season, Giambi had a cortisone shot in the elbow four days ago. His power resurgence is a good sign for the Yankees as the season's homestretch approaches.

The Yankees led the Royals, 2-1, when Gary Sheffield and Alex Rodriguez singled off Royals starter Zack Greinke with one out in the third inning. Giambi then worked the count to 2-2 before barely sending a high cutter over the wall in right-center field. He made a curtain call, and the 54,951 fans rewarded him with deafening cheers.

In the fifth inning, Rodriguez singled with one out before Giambi hit a 3-1 fastball from Greinke into the first rows of the upper deck in right field. Giambi again made a curtain call, and the response was even louder.

It was Giambi's sixth multihomer game of the season and the 29th of his career. He had not homered since Aug. 4, when he hit two at Cleveland.

"I'm booing myself just as bad as they're booing me," Giambi said when asked about how he handled himself during a slump. "I want to play good. Like I said, it's never personal here. They're the first ones that give you the standing O when you do something special."

In the sixth inning, the Yankees had runners at second and third with one out when the Royals left-hander Jeremy Affeldt intentionally walked the right-handed Rodriguez to pitch to the left-handed Giambi. Giambi singled through the hole at second to give the Yankees a 9-1 lead.

Giambi's day overshadowed a fine pitching performance from Al Leiter, who went six innings and earned a victory for the first time in three outings.

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Before the game, Torre said the key to Leiter's success would probably be his pitch count. If Leiter kept it low early and gave the bullpen some relief, the way he did in his previous start, a 5-4 victory against the Toronto Blue Jays on Tuesday, the Yankees would have a good chance of winning, Torre said.

Leiter needed 23 pitches to get through the first inning, and he struck out the side in the second. He threw 112 total pitches, striking out six and allowing two hits.

"We just opened it up," Leiter said. "It's completely different for a starting pitcher, obviously, in a 1-1 game, a 2-1 game. Then it goes to 5-1 and then 7-1. It's much easier to pitch; less regard for corners and you just start thinking middle of the plate. And that's what started to happen."

Leiter had trouble throwing strikes in the third inning, and the Royals cut the Yankees' lead to 2-1 when Denny Hocking scored on David DeJesus's groundout to first. Leiter had loaded the bases with a double and two walks. But he induced a popout and a groundout to second base to end the threat.

Leiter then settled down, retiring the next seven batters he faced.

"He got into trouble early on but he pitched out," Derek Jeter said. "That's exactly what we needed."

Jeter, who made a leaping catch to rob Mike Sweeney of a hit in the sixth, also reached a milestone when he scored in the bottom of the inning. He has scored 100 or more runs in 9 of his 10 full seasons.

The Yankees picked up where they left off Saturday, when they scored five runs in the ninth inning to beat the Royals, 8-7. In the first inning yesterday, they took a 2-0 lead when Bernie Williams's chopper squirted between the first and second basemen.

Williams, the designated hitter yesterday, went 6 for 13 with two homers and seven R.B.I. in the series against the Royals. He also knocked in the Yankees' last run with a single in the sixth inning and finished with three R.B.I.

Tanyon Sturtze relieved Leiter and surrendered a two-run homer to Sweeney in the eighth. But the Yankees were too far ahead for it to matter.

The Yankees begin a seven-day, seven-game trip today with the first of four games against the Mariners in Seattle. They have plenty of momentum, having won six of seven games at Yankee Stadium.